At approximately 9:15am EST, Fielder Hiss took the main stage at SolidWorks World 2013 and announced the forthcoming SolidWorks/Dassault 3D Experience platform transitional product, SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual. It mixes together two modeling methods to make the modeling more fluid and at first sight looks fairly minimal, but on the backend builds on Dassault’s database-driven technology to introduce a more secure, connected design environment.

SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual

Users and SolidWorks World attendees are already calling it SMC and SWMC with the Twitter stream erupting with comments on the new product.

So, SolidWorks Mechanical Concpetual combines what we’re seeing as a trend in 3D design software over the last couple years, putting parametric modeling and direct editing in a single interface. It’s not clear if it’s at the mesh-whipping level that Power Surfacing for SolidWorks, but it is a step in that general direction. On top of the parametric/direct modeling paradigms in one, you’ll also find the software tied to a central backbone, with all data living within a object-oriented database–all part of the plan to further tie SolidWorks into the Dassault

It’s our job to think about the tools and capabilities you will need five, ten, even fifteen years down the road to keep you competitive. We owe that to you.

To make that happen, our plan is to leverage the strength and capabilities of the Dassault Systèmes 3DExperience Platform and build a new experience that is as intuitive and easy to use as the SolidWorks tools you use today. Today, I want to share the first example of this new approach, which we are calling SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual.

Instinctive Design
Evolving a concept is where SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual really begins to speed the design time. Most systems force you to think about product structure in order to capture ideas.

Social Innovation
When you feel that sufficient concepts have been captured, then it’s key to be able to engage stakeholders (both internal to the organization as well as with customers and vendors) to get feedback on the best path forward.

Connected
SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual is always connected to the design database and to other users. This gives us the ability to secure your data, prevent data loss from any crashes, and automatically save iterations of each concept.

Testing is set to begin in May, with general availability on October 2013 (probably near the release of SolidWorks 2014.)

Excited? We were wondering how Dassault was going to transition the SolidWorks product to V6. Does this design tool make you curious about how Dassault is leveraging their technology to introduce SolidWorks users to their platform? Even more, does it make you want to jump in and try it out?

About Josh Mings

Josh is co-founder of EvD Media. He engineers and designs, is the Director of Marketing for Luxion, is CSWP certified for SolidWorks training and support and excels at falling awkwardly. He is editor of SolidSmack.com and co-host of EngineerVsDesigner.com, a weekly podcast about design, engineering and what makes it all happen.